Cheer for Canada or shut up!

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STEVE BUFFERY, QMI Agency

Jun 8, 2012

, Last Updated: 1:24 AM ET

TORONTO - Now that the Stanley Cup playoffs are crawling to a conclusion, we avert our attention to a game with much more offence and scoring chances. Soccer.

Okay, here’s the deal. For years, we’ve been lectured about how soccer is The Beautiful Game (and it can be, if you take away the diving and the other weasely shenanigans) and how it’s the most popular game worldwide. Fine. Put your money where your mouth is. If you’re reading this, you probably live in Canada. And if you’re a soccer fan, and you’re not from Honduras, get out and support the Canadian team on June 12 at BMO Field in World Cup qualifying.

As we’ve seen too often in the past (usually in Toronto), the Canadian soccer team gets less support than the visiting side at home games. If the Honduran supporters are louder and more noticeable than the Canadian supporters on June 12, the disgrace continues. We all know that soccer fans in Canada cheer for the country of their ancestry (I certainly cheer for England at the Euro and World Cups), but unless Canada is playing your grand-pappy’s home country, there’s no excuse — if you love the game, and this country — not to get out and cheer Canada. Listening to supporters from some small Latin American country out-cheer Team Canada supporters in Toronto makes me sick.

TFC DOESN'T DESERVE THIS LOYALTY

How pathetic is Toronto FC? And by connection MLSE? On Thursday, they fired head coach Aron Winter — the team’s sixth head coach in six seasons, with no playoff appearances. (Paul Mariner is No. 7). Yes, somebody deserves to be fired, perhaps not just the head coach. Weren’t we told just a week or two ago to have faith in Winter’s system? It’s amazing that this sad sack of an organization continues maintain its intensely loyal fan base. It’s time for MLSE to start refunding money.

EMPTY CUP

So the Stanley Cup ratings on NBC and NBC Sports Network are down from last year, to the point of being dismal.

There’s talk that the ratings have suffered because, unlike in past years, the Cup final is going head to head against the NBA conference finals as a result of the late start to the NBA season. There are many other excuses for the poor ratings. But perhaps the simple reason is the games have largely been boring. End of story.

FAMOUS DOESN'T MEAN FUNNY

Watched Metta World Peace do the weather on the Vancouver TV station. One Toronto radio guy described it as “good stuff.”

Really? It’s amazing how being a celebrity automatically makes anything you do amusing.

We live in a celebrity-worshipping society, that’s for sure, when something like Metta’s weather bit was considered good stuff.

It’s like in media scrums. If an athlete says something remotely amusing, everyone laughs like the dude’s the second coming of Fatty Arbuckle.

Meanwhile, if you crack the same joke around your buddies, you get a resounding yawn.

L.A. FOX 11 anchorwoman Christine Devine for calling hometown goalie Jonathan Quick, Jonathan Swift on a telecast. Here’s a hint for Devine. Jonathan Swift wrote A Critical Essay Upon The Faculties Of The Mind. Jonathan Quick sometimes sprays water in his face.

WHILE I'M AT IT

-- Wake me up when the NHL CBA talks are over. I don’t care about them. I don’t care what the issues are. I know somebody has to report it. Better them than me. Life’s too short to worry about crap like that. When they start playing, I’ll force myself to watch hockey again.

-- Gotta love J.P. Arencibia’s Twitter site. The Jays catcher is a big puck fan and will drop a wacky hockey reference in interviews. After Wednesday’s win in Chicago, he listed three stars from the game, including the Jays fans who travelled to the Windy City for the game. Atta Boy J.P.